Early Years Foundation Stage

At Inspire Academy, our Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) staff are passionate about early childhood development and education.

Our approach to delivering the statutory EYFS curriculum is to balance formal, teacher led input with opportunities for pupils to extend and embed their learning in an ‘Independent Learning’ context.

During the teacher led sessions, children work with an adult to complete activities set at an appropriate level for their ability.

During independent learning time, children are encouraged to explore different learning areas both indoors and outdoors, where activities are set up for them to access without direct adult teaching.

The Early Years Foundation Stage framework specifies the requirement for learning and development in the Early Years and provides specific areas of learning we must cover in our curriculum.

These areas are:

Personal, Social and Emotional Development

Physical Development

Communication and Language development

Literacy

Mathematics

Understanding the World

Expressive Arts and Design opportunities for pupils to extend and embed their learning in an ‘Independent Learning’ context.

The prime areas of Physical Development, Communication and Language and Personal, Social and Emotional Development are embedded and developed in every part of school life including in the classroom, during assemblies, in the canteen and at break times.

All adults in the school are trained to encourage pupils’ development in these areas during any interaction throughout the school day.

The specific areas of Writing, Reading, Numeracy and Shape, Space and Measure are taught relatively formally through teacher led input. In September, this starts with short sessions and builds up to longer sessions as the year progresses.

Our EYFS is very much a part of the whole school and the children integrate with our older pupils on a daily basis, so that they are well prepared for transition into Key Stage 1.